Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Evaluations That Mean Something


E4E is running commercials telling the public how much they want a new evaluation system so they know how they are doing and how they can improve. 

Anyone who needs this sort of evaluation to know how their doing is not doing very well and has no business in the classroom.

I recently cleaned out a drawer full of old observation reports, reports done by an experienced assistant principal, a master teacher.  I remembered the way my heart dropped through the floor when I heard her keys jingling in the back door and the sick feelings I used to get when I met with her after the lesson.  I remember carefully reading every word of  the three pages she handed me summarizing my lesson, mentioning both strengths and weaknesses and only breathing a sigh of relief when I saw the word satisfactory  The words this woman both wrote and spoke were the words that helped me become the teacher I am.  They had nothing to do with test scores or data.  She knew we taught an at risk population, made sure we did everything possible to help them succeed and used her superior knowledge to help us be the best teachers possible. 

Today's administrators need test scores because they lack knowledge and skill.  Getting a degree from a weekend course, using borrowed papers and then supervising a department never taught in does not a master teacher make and do nothing to create even barely competent teachers.
 

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Are they evaluating Administrators? better yet are the teachers evaluating Administrators? Do Guidance Counselors receive evaluations?